Romney, Obama and the bin Laden raid

Mitt Romney in New Hampshire

Brian Snyder, Reuters

"Even Jimmy Carter would have given that order,'' Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, seen at a campaign stop Monday in New Hampshire, said about President Barack Obama's ordering of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden.

"Even Jimmy Carter would have given that order,'' Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, seen at a campaign stop Monday in New Hampshire, said about President Barack Obama's ordering of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden. (Brian Snyder, Reuters)

Mitt Romney scoffs at the notion that Barack Obama displayed admirable leadership in ordering the raid that killed Osama bin Laden a year ago. "Even Jimmy Carter would have given that order," he said, which suggests it was an easy, obvious decision -- like drafting Michael Jordan first in the NBA draft.

But Jordan wasn't the first pick in the 1984 draft. He was the third, proof that decisions that look like a slam dunk in hindsight have to be made without knowledge of how they'll turn out.

The bin Laden raid looks pretty good from the perspective of April 30, 2012. But when the president was contemplating the opportunity, it looked very uncertain and possibly disastrous. CIA director Leon Panetta said afterward that there was only a 60 to 80 percent chance bin Laden was in the targeted compound. You can make a pretty good case even now that it was too risky.

There were grave dangers in undertaking it. Navy Seals could have been trapped and killed. Their helicopters could have been shot down before or after they arrived. They could have wound up in close combat with Pakistani forces. Bin Laden could have escaped.

It took great nerve to go ahead. Had the raid failed, Obama had to know he would be reviled as incompetent and foolhardy. His presidency would have taken a devastating blow. But he signed off on it, resolved to accept the consequences, just as he had pledged in the campaign.

Robert Gates, who was not only Obama's defense secretary but George W. Bush's, has said, "I worked for a lot of these guys and this is one of the most courageous calls -- decisions -- that I think I've ever seen a president make." Dismissing it has to be one of the most revealing that Romney has made.